hot seat—
1. (coll., also: hot chair) an uncomfortable position of authority where one has to make difficult decisions:
- I am now sitting in this hot seat as a film critic whose job it is to analyze a film.
2. (Air Force) an ejection seat in an aircraft:
- McClane was able to press the ejection switch of a hot seat just in time to escape from an exploding plane.
3. (sl., also: hot chair) the electric chair:
- A newspaper reporter said he heard the lad announce that he was not afraid to die “in the hot seat.”
hot seating—
1. sharing of desks or equipment by office shift workers, etc.:
- In these schools, double shifts, known as “hotseating,” are the norm.
2. (role-playing technique) pretending to be a literary character and answering the relevant questions in the “hot seat”:
- Hot seating is a way of finding out more about the characters in stories, plays, or poems.